


Heart Knows Best

by Angy98



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-03
Updated: 2021-03-03
Packaged: 2021-03-16 04:14:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,510
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29819253
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Angy98/pseuds/Angy98
Summary: The ulimate power wish is an equivalent exchange; to turn a robot into a human, it would turn another human into a robot. To save a life it would have to cut another...But if worded differently, it won't necessarily bring death. And maybe, the unexpected outcome that originates from it is better than what the original plan could have brough.
Relationships: Gabriel Agreste | Papillon | Hawk Moth/Nathalie Sancoeur
Comments: 5
Kudos: 22
Collections: GabeNath Book Club and Art Club Server





	Heart Knows Best

Gabriel paces back and forth around the room.

He’s been doing so for who knows how long, alternating his nervous pacing with pauses where he sits down on the room’s chair watching over Nathalie as she sleeps.

He tried to warn her, when he finally reached the underground crypt and found her about to take on her shoulders a power that was going to be too much for her to handle, but she didn’t listen. Everything around them trembled and the artificial lights flickered, when the two most powerful Miraculous jewels were combined.

She fell to the ground after casting the spell, and everything stopped existing for Gabriel until he made sure that, even if feeble, she still had a pulse. He tried to gently shake her awake, and she actually came back to consciousness long enough to ask if the wish worked and to catch a glimpse of Emilie’s chamber still locked.

Marinette and Adrien were there too; they had found a way to descend into the crypt, probably looking to retrieve the Miraculouses that were stolen from them.

Adrien called an ambulance and, as they waited for help to come, Gabriel gave the two teenagers their jewels, apologizing wholeheartedly for everything he’d done.

  
  


Gabriel sees her head move slightly in the corner of his eye, and immediately goes to sit next to her on the bed.

“Hey!” He greets Nathalie when her eyes blink open. “You woke up.” He says, a faint relieved smile appearing on his lips.

“I did,” she simply states. Silence falls onto the room. “So… this is the first day of our lives after the wish, huh?” Nathalie asks after a while, taking a look around.

Everything looks like it always did, from the furniture of the room to the frames on the walls and to her things on her nightstand. Gabriel looks the same as well, the only difference being the fact that he is a little disheveled and looks tired. She has been imagining that day for months and months, now, and somehow her mind thought that Emilie’s return would have brought such a difference as to drastically change everything around her. Seeing that the most powerful spell in the world left everything the exact way it was almost feels like a let down…

“It seems so. How do you feel? Any better?”

Nathalie keeps looking away. “I would have felt better knowing that two years of schemes, and lies and efforts led to actually saving Emilie.” The woman replies, and Gabriel can’t help but catch the irritation in her voice.

The man frowns. “Well,  _ I _ feel better knowing that you didn’t end up being the second corpse in the crypt.” He replies, angered. “You dropped unconscious to the ground right after making the wish. How do you think  _ I _ felt, at that moment, thinking that I lost one of the most important people to me? Right now, all I care about is that you’re alive and safe, and it should be the same for you!”

Nathalie holds his gaze for a couple more seconds. “You’re right,” she murmurs, looking down to her hand resting on the blanket. “Thank you for your concern.”

Gabriel calms down as well. The last thing he wants now is to fight with her. “I am glad to see that you haven’t lost your stubbornness,” he jokes, trying to lighten up the mood. He stands up to give Nathalie a soft kiss on her forehead, smiling at her. When he sits back down, his hands reach for hers, holding them delicately.

Nathalie freezes, taken aback by the sudden intimacy. “What are you doing?”

The light in Gabriel’s eyes tones down. “Please, promise me you won’t get mad for what I’m about to tell you.” He pleads, genuinely fearing her reaction. “While you were asleep, I had some time to think about what happened, and… I know why Emilie didn’t come back after the wish.”

Nathalie’s face drops. “Did I word it wrong?” The woman asks in a thin whisper, her voice cut by worry and guilt.  _ Did I waste our only chance?  _

She feels her eyes water. “It was all my fault. I should have asked more directly. Maybe, if I actually spoke her name-”

“No! You-” Gabriel interrupts her. “You worded it perfectly. You said something so nice, asking for me to be happy with the ones I love. I don’t think I could have asked for something better myself! I tend to make… unwise decisions, and this way at least we know for sure that something good will come out of it.”

“You see,” Gabriel continues after a moment of silence, “there’s a chance that… I wouldn’t have been happy with Emilie around…” The man states, and it’s hard for him to actually pronounce those words.

Nathalie’s only reaction is to stare at him, her brows furrowed in confusion.

“The last couple of months were... a constant struggle for me. I woke up, I saw her pictures, and I felt more and more guilty.” Gabriel starts to explain. He had  _ so much _ to explain... “I decided to stop being Hawkmoth; it was becoming all so  _ useless _ . Every akuma I sent out was more and more meaningless; whenever I was in the lair, my mind and my body ached to be somewhere else. There was a voice, a force, pulling me towards other directions. I tried ignoring it, I decided that what I felt just couldn’t be possible, that I was mistaken. I believed so for months, but the harder I tried to fight that little voice, the louder it screamed. Until one sleepless night, merely a week ago, when my mind found itself surrendering to that mysterious pull.”

Nathalie sits up in bed, leaning back against the headboard as she listens to his words, trying to keep up with his fast-paced messy explanation.  _ A ‘little voice’? ‘Other directions’? _ What does he mean with this? Everything he is saying sounds strange and incredible, like words coming from a dream or a parallel reality. 

“I wanted to tell you, I should have told you the very moment I figured it out, but I found myself paralyzed. This morning I finally gathered the courage to speak with you, but when I knocked on your door, you weren’t in your room. I saw the news, the chaos, how you went out and defeated Ladybug by yourself… My heart stopped when I realized just how drastic this whole affair was.” Gabriel goes on. “It’s an equivalent exchange, a life for a life, the Grimoire said, and only in that moment I realized that you or Adrien could have been in danger.”

“I immediately ran where I knew I would have found you, and I arrived just in time to see you combine the Miraculouses. I was terrified at the thought that I was about to lose you! I couldn’t lose you, especially not when…” He looks deep into Nathalie’s eyes and takes a deep breath. “... not when I had just realized that I am _in love_ _with you_.”

Nathalie doesn’t move nor say anything, staring at him in surprise. “Please, say something.” Gabriel prods her. “Anything, even if it’s just to say that I’ve been a fool.”

“Why did you think I would get mad at you?” Nathalie eventually speaks.

“Because I was always so stubborn, because I allowed myself to make you go through all of this… for nothing!” Gabriel replies, his grey eyes clouded by guilt. “Because I should have stopped all this madness at the first signals; I would have saved everyone so much hurt, and-”

“Come here.” Nathalie halts him quietly. “Come here,” she invites him again when she sees he’s not moving, holding her arms up.

Gabriel moves to sit closer to her, and Nathalie reaches out to hug him, leaning into him. “I am in no position to define you as a fool, Gabriel. Not when I’ve done so many foolish things myself. And yes, I am a little mad, but  _ at destiny _ , not at you.”

The two of them hold each other quietly. Her mind, tired out by a day that lasted way too long and confused by the many different emotions that it brought, has yet to fully comprehend that he just confessed his love for her. “I love you too,” she smiles and whispers quietly once the big news finally sinks in.

Gabriel pulls back surprised. “You do?”

“I do.” Nathalie smiles fondly at him, and having the chance to finally say what she’d been aching to scream for almost two years feels like an immense relief.

She lays back down on the bed; she’s exhausted, and her body still needs to recover from the residues of the magical energy that ran through her earlier that day. Gabriel lays down next to her, holding her hand.

Many things will have to be sorted out in the morning, but for now they sleep peacefully with the certainty that the most powerful spell in the world indeed changed everything, and for the better.


End file.
